Ken Robinson: Bring on the Learning Revolution
Ken Robinson's video about the need for a revolution, not evolution, in learning in public education gave me a lot to consider. The goal of education is to prepare students for life. Yet, as Robinson's research suggests, the majority of our population does not love what they do, they endure it. Working only for the weekends when they get a break from the drudgery. I wholeheartedly agree that this is an extremely sad existence for those precious students we have dedicated our lives to educate.
Robinson calls for a revolution in education. He states that education reform is a dead end. With reform we are working to repair a model that is broken. We must have a paradigm shift in order to revolutionize the educational system. Currently, we think of education in a linear model; start to finish, getting all students ready for college. Our current educational system is based on conformity and does not take into consideration the diversity of our students' abilities. As educators we must remember that communities depend on a wide range of abilities and we must reconstitute our idea of intelligence. We must find our students passions and nurture their dreams, whatever they may be. As educators, we provide the environment and conditions under which students can flourish.
The PBL model is the ideal setting to provide students with an environment in which they can flourish. Using the PBL model, teachers can tap into students' passions and interests by offering them choices, autonomy, and ownership in their learning. The experiences in the classroom are authentic and students use their own unique abilities to create projects to share. They are able to see how others think and integrate that knowledge into their own learning processes.
I am excited about beginning the PBL journey. I currently teach using integrated units but it is almost exclusively teacher driven. In the upcoming year my units will be student driven and sustained inquiry will be an essential part of each unit. The process of learning will be most important, not the final project. The biggest challenges I will overcome as I begin this year will be management of students (particularly at the beginning of the year when getting in line is a challenge) and assessing student growth/progress throughout the unit.
Hi Shanna,
ReplyDeleteI always appreciate the thoughtfulness of your responses. This one is no different. You did an excellent job considering the points Sir Ken Robinson made in his Ted Talk promoting a revolution in education toward customization of student learning and providing opportunities for students to create their own learning paths rather than proceed down a linear fashion prescribed in advance by their teacher. Taking into consideration what we've learned about multiple intelligences and how students construct new learning based on both new and existing experiences should influence how we plan and implement instruction. I am thankful that you are already reflecting on your instruction and are considering how to take what you are currently doing well with integrated units of study and improve student engagement and inquiry based learning through pbl.